Artist's easels are generally used to support an artist's work piece, such as a pad of paper, a canvas stretched on a frame, a wooden board, or any other such somewhat two dimensional work piece. Supporting the work piece on an easel generally allows the artist to position the work piece at acceptable vertical and horizontal positions so that the artist may easily work on the work piece, such as by painting, drawing, carving or the like.
Many prior art easels comprise a tripod design including three support legs, each leg extending outwardly from a common attachment point at the peak of the legs. The legs of these tripod designs may become a tripping hazard for an artist and generally require a relatively large amount of space behind the work piece. Moreover, these tripod designs generally do not allow the position of the work piece to be easily adjusted during work on the work piece.
Easels including pulley systems have been utilized to adjustably position a work piece. In U.S. Pat. No. 4,726,555 to Andrews, a pulley system easel is disclosed wherein the work piece may be horizontally and vertically adjusted. However, the easel pulley system disclosed is quite large compared to the size of the work piece that may be adjustably positioned on the easel. In particular, the pulley system is positioned externally behind and above the work piece support area such that the easel is approximately twice as high as the work piece that may be supported on the easel. Accordingly, this easel may be difficult to utilize in studio spaces having a relatively short ceiling height. Moreover, the Andrews easel includes a relatively large floor base such that the easel may be difficult to utilize in studio spaces having a relatively small floor area.
Therefore, for these and other reasons there is a need for the present invention.